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Revelations

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"And of all illumination which human reason can give, none is

comparable to the discovery of what we are, our nature, our obligations,

what happiness we are capable of, and what are the means of attaining it."
-Adam Weishaupt-

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Mercedes was a beautiful woman. Sam never even pretended to think otherwise. He'd seen his fair share of beautiful women, Quinn and Tina, one of his best mates' wife, being amongst them. There was something different about this girl, though. Something that pulled at him, that caused him to dream about her. It worried him that while he hadn't forgotten she was part of the reason he was a prisoner in this house, he no longer held it against her. Oh, he'd wanted to hate her so badly. He should have.

She kept him here against his will, and had threatened his life on numerous occasions. But there were moments, when she must have thought no one was watching, where she let her guard down and he couldn't take his eyes off her. Moments like now. Mercedes sat on the edge of her back porch, lost

in thought. Her features, which had oh so hardened with time, had softened. Watching her from the kitchen, Sam couldn't help but feel for her; so sad, yet strong- even if she didn't realize it. She smiled softly to herself, and what a smile it was. No, Sam couldn't hold anything against her, even if he tried.

They'd spent the last few days making small talk and while she hadn't made a complete 180, he had seen a subtle change in her. Mercedes was more relaxed, offering frequent smiles that had begun to meet her eyes. He wasn't stupid. The dark beauty was still a walking ticking time-bomb that could go from sweet to deadly in a second. He'd be a lying fool if he said he hadn't grown a soft spot for her.

"Don't do it," came a voice from behind him. Sam glanced around to see Puck behind him, before returning his gaze onto Mercedes. "Don't fall for her. This never lasts."

"What never lasts?" asked Sam quietly.

"This vulnerability. You think you can help her, and she wants to believe that you can." Puck stepped beside him and crossed his arms. "But you can't, and what you're doing is going to kill her. That's how we survived so long. We shut down. Maybe we have normal moments, like now. They never stay."

"I don't see how I'm killing her."

"They say people can die of broken hearts. Ours is shattered. She'll start to feel, and the pain will overwhelm her and she'll die." Puck stared hard at Mercedes. "We live off anger and the occasional fear. I'm not ready to let her go just yet, not because of some big lipped jerk we kidnapped by mistake."

Sam smiled softly. He was getting through to Mercedes, or else Puck would have ignored him like he always had. It shouldn't have made him as happy as it did, to know Puck felt something as well- not when he was neither his patient nor his friend. "You love her."

"As much as I can." Puck nodded. "At least, I don't want her to ever leave and I can't watch her get hurt. If that's love, then yes. She and Santana are my family. You can't understand what we are." Sam was silent as he listened to Puck, and didn't miss the cold, frustrated tone in which the man continued. "But you'll stay and you'll keep trying to help her. She'll let you, because she trusts you. Just know when it kills her, I'll come after you. I'm looking out for the both of you."

"Yeah, and how?" asked Sam, incredulously. "You and Santana walk around here and never miss out on a chance to threaten me. You wanted to kill me and now you're making a big deal out of me trying to be a friend for her, when I know you sleep around. You call yourself a sex god for Christ's sake and I'm supposed to understand why she can't have a friend? Just one. How's that even fair? And you even have the nerve to say you're looking out for me."

"She can fuck whoever she wants. I really don't give a shit. She could fuck her way through Lima for all I care. That's her right. But a friend..." Puck shook his head. "A friend like you will break whatever's left of her heart. A friend is intimate, sex doesn't have to be. I just hope you realize how insane it is to be friends with one of your kidnappers."

Sam merely shrugged and walked away. Maybe Puck was right and what he was doing wasn't normal at all, but he couldn't let Mercedes suffer that much. Not when she made it clear she wanted to get better. He stepped outside, and relaxed, feeling the heat of the sun against his skin. Mercedes was still siting, her back to him.

"I was wondering when you'd join me." she said as Sam settled beside her.

"You weren't waiting too long, I hope."

"Not at all. I was enjoying the weather, besides, I knew Puck wanted to speak to you." she smiled. "So what are you going to do?" There was no double-meaning in her words, no death glare. Only curiosity.

"You asked for my help." he answered, with an edge to his voice. "I'm giving it to you. So, why don't you tell me how the Murphys died? It's been a few days-"

"And you've been patient. Thank you." interrupted Mercedes. She breathed in deeply, and looked away from him, but not before he saw the walls were put firmly back into place. "Puck forgot to feed Apollo one day. He'd been sick, and it just slipped his mind. Marissa went into a fit. God, she cried so much I thought she'd die of dehydration. I told you Glenn had a temper, well he had an even bigger one that day. He was on Puck in a second, beating him." Sam reached for her hand and gripped it tightly, despite her tensing under his touch. "I hit him- Glenn- hard across the back of the head with the pan I'd been using from supper. He turned ready to hit me but Santana came out of nowhere and just stabbed him in the gut. Puck took over after that, and made up for all the years he hadn't been able to defend us or himself. Meanwhile, Marissa stopped crying and tried to handle me and Santana, but we did the same thing to her. It was like an adrenaline rush. I don't know, but as soon as we started, we couldn't stop. It felt good, you know?"

He didn't, couldn't know. "You beat them to death?"

"God, no." Mercedes closed her eyes, in what he supposed was shame. "They were dying. A mess of broken bones, bruises and stab wounds. We took their van and I sent Puck and Tana to packed it with money and the few other things we wanted, while I kept an eye on Glenn and Marissa. When that was done, we poured gasoline on them and lit them on fire. They were still alive and we were only sixteen."

Sam let go of her hand and recoiled in horror. Just the thought of it all was enough to make him sick. It was one thing to stab someone, but to watch them burn?

"You can't understand how it felt to hear them scream, to see them suffer. I was happy, so damn happy. We all were. For the first time, I felt like we were okay. Like we could do anything. We were free! They weren't going to hurt us anymore!" Mercedes smiled at the memory. "It was the best feeling in the world. We saved Apollo while the house was burning, and left. I only looked back once. Just in time to see the house collapse on their bodies. We'd been planning on escaping for a while. We stole money from the safe every once in a while and hid it in a cave in the nearby forest. So, we went to retrieve that money and never went back. We've been here ever since. We thought we'd be happy, but we weren't. What we felt when we watched the Murphy's die? We couldn't feel it anymore. It would have been easier if we had never felt it at all, because now... now all we want is that feeling back."

"So now you kill people who look like Glenn and Marissa, because you get that feeling or at least some of it back." concluded Sam, and Mercedes nodded. It made sense, in a twisted sort of way. Having never felt such an intense joy before their death, her brain had associated happiness and hope with their murder. The trio had probably tried and failed to get the correct formula in order to be happy countless times. They would have killed random people in random ways first, and when that failed they would have attempted to get random people and killed them in the same manner they killed the Murphys. Until finally, they would have picked people who resembled them physically. And that would work, because their brains had been programmed to believe it. Which explained why Mercedes had told him he wasn't their type. This changed everything.

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Three hours later, Sam had visited every room in the old house with the exception of the basement which was home to Apollo. There was no way in hell he was going in there alone. Especially since he knew for certain that it had tasted human flesh on numerous occasions. The house wasn't as scary as he thought it would have been. Sure, esthetic touch ups were needed here and there, but it wasn't haunted. At least, he almost certain it wasn't. Finally bored, Sam went looking for Mercedes, hoping to finish the conversation that had been so rudely interrupted by Santana, who needed a few minutes alone with her. He hadn't expected Mercedes to grip his hand and send him a warning glance before sending him inside alone and as much as he wanted to know what they were talking about, he hadn't eavesdropped.

During his stroll in the house, he'd replayed his conversations with her over and over again in his mind. After much debating, he decided she really wasn't to blame. Of course, murdering was terrible and they needed to change that, but could he really blame her? If anyone was to blame, it was Glenn and Marissa Murphy who had taken innocent children and treated them terribly. They had created monsters. What Mercedes needed was love and plenty of it. None of this was her fault, was it? Suddenly, he didn't feel so guilty for being attracted to her. Not when she as much a victim as he and everyone else involved was.

He entered her room, and frowned when he found it empty. On her bed, a very pretty black dress was laid out, as were jewelery, lingerie and a pair of black stilettos. Mercedes hadn't mentioned going anywhere, so it surprised him. Then he heard it, the sound of dripping water and a quiet humming.

"Mercedes?" he called, uncertain.

"In the bathroom!"

He hesitated, unsure whether to wait in her bedroom or go to her private bathroom. He opted for the first option, and sat on her bed. Walking into the bathroom meant seeing her naked in her bath, and he wasn't ready for that. Not just yet. It wasn't long before she stepped out of the bathroom, her hair still damp and a towel wrapped around her.

"Is there a problem?" she asked, arching a brow.

"I just wanted to finish our conversation from before,"

"There's nothing else to say." she said, and he frowned at her tone. "I want to be happy again, and if I have to kill a million people then so be it. Until you prove me otherwise, I don't have a choice."

Sam shook his head, but decided not to press the matter. He didn't want the progress they had made to disappear in one night because he asked to make questions at the wrong time. Keep the chit chat simple, he told himself.

"Are you going anywhere?" he asked, gesturing to clothes on her bed.

Mercedes laughed, and shook her head. "You always were funny. So innocent, even after you know everything. It's Hunt Night. Didn't you know?"

"What are you...?" His eyes widened as realization struck. This was the night when Santana and Puck went hunting for their next victims. Two more people would meet their deaths so that the trio could relive the over-whelming feeling of hope they had felt when they had watched the Murphys die. "You can't. You have to stop this!"

"Haven't you been listening to what I've been telling you?" asked Mercedes, her voice cool and detached. "I can't help myself. You were supposed to fix me. You couldn't, otherwise we wouldn't be here right now, talking about something we both know will never change." she turned away from him, reaching for her bra, but he grabbed her arm. She'd only explained the whole story today. He hadn't had enough time to help her, to find a way to experience the hope without murdering.

"Please," he was desperate to help not only the innocent men and women who would meet their deaths that night, but the lost woman who stood before him. "You want to change. Now's the perfect chance to do that. Stop Santana and Puck, save those people. Don't you remember how unhappy you were when you were with Glenn? That's what they'll be feeling."

Mercedes yanked her arm away from his grasp and took a step back, gripping the towel that covered her tightly. He heard the unspoken "And what about my feelings". For a second, Sam was terrified he'd stepped out of line and upset her, but she shook her head and turned away.

"Get out, please."

It took Sam a moment to realize the words had come from her. She had spoken with a sense of vulnerability that was unaccustomed to her. For the first time since their meeting, he could finally see the doubt she claimed to feel reflected in her tone and face. It was why he paused at the door way on his way out and looked back at her, the beautiful and dangerous woman.

"You think you don't have a choice, that you can't make it without this extra push. It's not true. If you let yourself try, you'd be amazed. But that's the thing isn't it? You can't try because despite all the confidence you ooze, you're terrified. Terrified of the future, terrified of what's inside you. So, you're just going to keep doing this and living in some type of haze where you're own emotions are strangers, because it's easier." he paused, as she turned to face him. "But I saw glimpses of the woman you could be, if you let yourself. She's not perfect, but no one is. And there was one thing she definitely wasn't: a coward." He closed the door quickly, before she could comment. Maybe he had taken a risk, speaking to her in such a manner but he didn't regret it. He wouldn't let himself. He went back to his room, hands in pockets silently praying that she wouldn't let him down.

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